This book is a work of fiction based entirely on the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons is purely coincidental. Real places mentioned in the book are depicted fictionally and are not intended to portray actual times or places. All rights reserved. No part of the book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the author, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

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Also by Bliss Addison:

A Battle of Wills (Shannon Murphy – Book I)

With Malicious Intent (Shannon Murphy – Book II)

Restless Souls

Wolfe, She Cried

Murder at the Villa Maria-Sedona Retirement Home

One Millhaven Lane

Deadly Serum

Prophesy

An Equal Measure

A Waning Moon

Watching Over Her

A Silver Lining (The Monahans – Part I)

A Little Rain Must Fall (The Monahans – Book II)

A Mistaken Belief (The Monahans – Book III)

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Summary:

Humor/Slice of Life

Sometimes plans carry out without a hitch, and sometimes nothing in a plan goes right, as is the case for Homicide Detective Jonah Leedes this particular night....

Homicide Detective Jonah Leedes arranges a romantic rendezvous with his wife at a posh hotel. A minute into their interlude, Jonah receives a call to investigate a possible homicide, coincidentally in the room next to his at The Spartacus. Seconds later, the hospital notifies his wife of an accident involving a city transit bus and a car. Several people have been seriously injured and hospital staff were to report to emergency immediately.

Jonah and Olivia part in the hotel hallway outside their room with a promise to pick up later where they'd left off. He enters the murder scene, finds the murderer — the victim's wife — still in the room, makes the arrest and considers the case open and shut, until the Doc arrives and pronounces that the victim died two hours before the wife arrived on the scene. Just then, Jonah receives a call from a fellow police officer stating that his sister-in-law Charlotte Armstrong was a passenger on the city transit bus that collided into the pumps of U-Serve Gas on Fifth Avenue. There was a glitch, though. Her body has disappeared.

Charlotte Armstrong, a high-strung outspoken woman with a bent toward revenge, unwittingly latches onto the back of Semiazas, a demon of Mephistopheles, when he appears on the accident scene to escort the bus driver's soul to Hades. Now, the devil has her but doesn't want her. Semiazas, on Mephistopheles' order, attempts to show Charlotte the way through the portal to the land of the living, which proves a task easier to issue than carry out.